Edward Emil Kirmhse

Edward Emil Kirmhse, known in this life by friends as Eddie was sixty years old when he took his final breath on the afternoon of September 2, 2016. He lived all his life on the West Coast, over the years living and working on several of the Gulf Islands, always returning again to his beloved Vancouver Island.
What is to be most remembered of a life after that life ceases to exist? We who remain choose the story to be told.
Eddie was my friend. I will remember him as a contemplative, gentle soul of soft heart, creative if sometimes troubled mind, and mirthful, philosophical disposition. My memory of him evokes a depth of emotion difficult to express in mere words. Potential never realized. Opportunities thwarted by self-doubt and hesitation, or simply missed. In some ways, a creative giant while in others an ordinary human, complete with debilitating stumbles. If Eddie's mark in this life is condensed to its most pure essence, it is a mosaic of music and art and the peace that emerges from living an uncomplicated, quiet life. His immense natural gift of music was perhaps his deepest source of creative satisfaction. What he may not have managed to express in words, his fingers marked upon every fretboard fortunate enough to sing the notes they so deftly played.
My friend and my most faithful penpal was lost to me long before I learned of his lonely demise in his small apartment in a peaceful neighbourhood in West Victoria. His final letter to me spoke of hope and rejuvenation and a renewed vigour for living. Whatever it is that tempts some of us to risk the fragile majesty of life for either a temporary glimpse of joy or a suspension of trouble has been described by many but mostly defies logic in its insidious nature and too often fatal allure.
I discovered the reason for Eddie's unusually long silence after a diligent search. I will forever remember the moment and the din of the realization that this time his absence was for good. It is with a profound sadness I leave these final words of tribute to a good soul, my faithful friend, Eddie.
Who will I write my letters to now you've sailed away
Who will answer from the distance of your wandering footsteps keeping time
Who will play the melody to my songs when finally I sing again
Who will recollect the pictures when so few occupied spaces in your mind
Who will tell me who you'd become over hardened years
Who will I invite for our reunion when will and courage align to make it so
Who was it I imagined could hold on to some ever thinning thread between
Who was it in the room to notice your slow graceless fall
Who was it you liked to call out as your only friend
Who was it called in vain your number disconnected
Who was it arrived late to knock at a pale door where life had already fled
Who is it hears your song playing long and wan and deep in the after
Who is it captures your ship at sea in an old wooden frame
Who is it plants white lilies on your lonesome grave
Who is it will remember the proper spelling of your name
Some of our friends
Never outrun the shadows that follow
And whether in their final moment it is to darkness or to peaceful relief, they succumb
We remember them just as well
Play on, my brother, to the stars.